His Second-best sword
Author: archaeologist_d
Title: His Second-Best Sword
Rating: PG
Pairing/s: none
Character/s: Merlin
Summary:. The other archaeologists were all excited. They’d found a sword in the Welsh hillfort, brilliant and beautiful, associated with the Dark Ages and a time of legend, and wondered about whose sword it was. But Merlin knew. It was Arthur’s second-best sword.
Warnings: none
Word Count: 840
Camelot_drabble # 556: Electric
Author’s notes: modern AU
Disclaimer: I do not own the BBC version of Merlin; They and Shine do. I am very respectfully borrowing them with no intent to profit. No money has changed hands. No copyright infringement is intended.
o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/
It was electric every time they found something. Merlin wasn’t the lead archaeologist on any of the digs he participated in, preferring to just doing a bunch of the grunt work. But the look on the young faces when they scrapped past a bit of dirt and revealed treasures from the past, be it a broken pot or single bead of amber from the Baltics, was its own reward.
There would be whispers and long, heated discussions of where their finds had come from, time periods, cultures and whether any of it related to past legends. Once in a while, Merlin would say something that would turn them in the right direction and the thanks he got was worth a thousand smiles.
The thing was that Merlin had lived too long. He’d been butcher, baker, pirate, priest, even a run on the stage although Will Shakespeare had called it more of a debacle. But he found that the longer he lived, the less he could connect back to his origins, that people blurred into memory and then nothingness, that towns and castles tumbled into dust, and it grieved him.
Digging bits and pieces up again was a way of bringing back the past, making it as golden and glorious as it had once been.
So if he uncovered an old drinking mug while on a dig in London that looked suspiciously like the one old Shakey Will had used, or a waterlogged Roman sandal from Vinlandia, a glass vial from Hailes Abbey, or a Cromwellian musket ball from Marsden Moor, that was all to the good.
But he hesitated when they offered him a place on the Welsh hillfort dig. They had no idea the memories that Merlin had there, that it was the Camelot of legend and he wasn’t sure just how much of it he could stand before he broke down and howled to the moon about the unfairness of it all.
In the end, though, he took the job. Knowing that he could protect it as much as reveal its secrets, that he could keep them from destroying the last vestige of his time with Arthur, he set about helping as much as he could.
There were cracked sculptures from those heady days, and broken bits of pottery that Gwen had once carried.
Wooden bowls and bits of iron, burnt grains and a few gold fragments which excited the treasure-hunters in them all but only made Merlin grieve more. Morgana’s necklace from the first days he knew her and all they did was whisk it away for later exhibitions.
But the worst or maybe the best thing happened the next to the last day of the dig. Merlin hadn’t found it but he heard the others calling out, excited about something. Hurrying over, he peered down into what once was the armoury.
The hilt was burnished bronze, its inlay almost as bright as the day Arthur had used it. Merlin remembered Elyan making the sword as a gift for Arthur’s birthday, plain at first but trying to show off his new skills with different coloured woods and bronze swirls and buffing it down until it felt like silk under Merlin’s hand.
It was Arthur’s second favourite sword, the one that had not been sunk into Avalon’s lake. The one he used most times, twirling and swirling in an effort to make Merlin grumble about clotpoles and showing off, and then laughing when he tossed it to Merlin for a bit of a polish.
The rest of the sword was there, too, needing more than a bit of a polish, but still, Merlin could see the ghost of Arthur’s hand grasping onto it, the memory of hunts and wars and Merlin sharpening it as they joked and insulted and lived in each other’s pockets.
He wanted to sharpen it now, but all he could do was step back and let the youngsters have their day. And if he crept into the storage room that night and contemplating stealing it away and keeping it close, then who was to know.
Instead, he let it go, and tried not to grieve too much.
------------------
Later, much later, standing in front of the display at the British Museum, Merlin wanted to reach out and feel the smoothness of that second-best sword once again, polish the metal until it shone brighter than the sun. For Arthur’s sake.
Sometimes, he could almost feel Arthur beside him, both of them staring down at the blade. Almost enjoy the weight of Arthur’s hand on Merlin’s shoulders or hear Arthur insulting him.
But it was only a sword and no hand to hold it. Only a memory of something long ago.
For when Arthur rose again, he would have no need of another sword. When Arthur rose again, his favourite sword would rise with him.
And the electricity of the day when they found the treasured artifact, that second-best sword, would be nothing to the joy in Merlin’s chest when he smiled at Arthur once more.
Title: His Second-Best Sword
Rating: PG
Pairing/s: none
Character/s: Merlin
Summary:. The other archaeologists were all excited. They’d found a sword in the Welsh hillfort, brilliant and beautiful, associated with the Dark Ages and a time of legend, and wondered about whose sword it was. But Merlin knew. It was Arthur’s second-best sword.
Warnings: none
Word Count: 840
Camelot_drabble # 556: Electric
Author’s notes: modern AU
Disclaimer: I do not own the BBC version of Merlin; They and Shine do. I am very respectfully borrowing them with no intent to profit. No money has changed hands. No copyright infringement is intended.
o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/o/
It was electric every time they found something. Merlin wasn’t the lead archaeologist on any of the digs he participated in, preferring to just doing a bunch of the grunt work. But the look on the young faces when they scrapped past a bit of dirt and revealed treasures from the past, be it a broken pot or single bead of amber from the Baltics, was its own reward.
There would be whispers and long, heated discussions of where their finds had come from, time periods, cultures and whether any of it related to past legends. Once in a while, Merlin would say something that would turn them in the right direction and the thanks he got was worth a thousand smiles.
The thing was that Merlin had lived too long. He’d been butcher, baker, pirate, priest, even a run on the stage although Will Shakespeare had called it more of a debacle. But he found that the longer he lived, the less he could connect back to his origins, that people blurred into memory and then nothingness, that towns and castles tumbled into dust, and it grieved him.
Digging bits and pieces up again was a way of bringing back the past, making it as golden and glorious as it had once been.
So if he uncovered an old drinking mug while on a dig in London that looked suspiciously like the one old Shakey Will had used, or a waterlogged Roman sandal from Vinlandia, a glass vial from Hailes Abbey, or a Cromwellian musket ball from Marsden Moor, that was all to the good.
But he hesitated when they offered him a place on the Welsh hillfort dig. They had no idea the memories that Merlin had there, that it was the Camelot of legend and he wasn’t sure just how much of it he could stand before he broke down and howled to the moon about the unfairness of it all.
In the end, though, he took the job. Knowing that he could protect it as much as reveal its secrets, that he could keep them from destroying the last vestige of his time with Arthur, he set about helping as much as he could.
There were cracked sculptures from those heady days, and broken bits of pottery that Gwen had once carried.
Wooden bowls and bits of iron, burnt grains and a few gold fragments which excited the treasure-hunters in them all but only made Merlin grieve more. Morgana’s necklace from the first days he knew her and all they did was whisk it away for later exhibitions.
But the worst or maybe the best thing happened the next to the last day of the dig. Merlin hadn’t found it but he heard the others calling out, excited about something. Hurrying over, he peered down into what once was the armoury.
The hilt was burnished bronze, its inlay almost as bright as the day Arthur had used it. Merlin remembered Elyan making the sword as a gift for Arthur’s birthday, plain at first but trying to show off his new skills with different coloured woods and bronze swirls and buffing it down until it felt like silk under Merlin’s hand.
It was Arthur’s second favourite sword, the one that had not been sunk into Avalon’s lake. The one he used most times, twirling and swirling in an effort to make Merlin grumble about clotpoles and showing off, and then laughing when he tossed it to Merlin for a bit of a polish.
The rest of the sword was there, too, needing more than a bit of a polish, but still, Merlin could see the ghost of Arthur’s hand grasping onto it, the memory of hunts and wars and Merlin sharpening it as they joked and insulted and lived in each other’s pockets.
He wanted to sharpen it now, but all he could do was step back and let the youngsters have their day. And if he crept into the storage room that night and contemplating stealing it away and keeping it close, then who was to know.
Instead, he let it go, and tried not to grieve too much.
------------------
Later, much later, standing in front of the display at the British Museum, Merlin wanted to reach out and feel the smoothness of that second-best sword once again, polish the metal until it shone brighter than the sun. For Arthur’s sake.
Sometimes, he could almost feel Arthur beside him, both of them staring down at the blade. Almost enjoy the weight of Arthur’s hand on Merlin’s shoulders or hear Arthur insulting him.
But it was only a sword and no hand to hold it. Only a memory of something long ago.
For when Arthur rose again, he would have no need of another sword. When Arthur rose again, his favourite sword would rise with him.
And the electricity of the day when they found the treasured artifact, that second-best sword, would be nothing to the joy in Merlin’s chest when he smiled at Arthur once more.